Ghosts of my past
Years of spooky tales and stories
SCARCELY AN OCTOBER PASSES that I’m not asked to share a few ghost tales I’ve encountered over the years.
Usually, I wrote only one ghost story a year—at Halloween—but did produce a half-hour collection each October during an earlier career in television.
My family wasn’t much for ghost stories, so I heard next to none as a boy; only one that I remember. And that one I overheard among two of my aunts and one of their cousins in a hushed and somber conversation.
As children, they believed that they and another friend had seen the apparition of a young girl—one of their friends and classmates—who had recently died unexpectedly. They said they were walking to school and saw her beside a small stream near their path. My memory is that they were all in agreement about what they had seen, including how she was dressed.
It wouldn’t be the last ghost tale I would hear.
Many years ago, the then-curator of Frankfort’s historic Liberty Hall showed me a photograph she’d taken of the home’s staircase after it was renovated. Midway down the stairs is a misty, translucent gray image of what appears to be an older woman with long hair, wearing a long gown. The curator said she had seen nothing unusual when she took the picture. So numerous have been the accounts of other sightings and strange incidents that Liberty Hall—which still has the ghostly photograph—now offers Gray Lady tours during October.
The owner of a bed and breakfast in a historic 11-room log home in rural Nelson County told me that although she had never seen an apparition, many other strange things had occurred there. One night in the kitchen, her small dog tucked her tail, whimpered and ran from the room as though being chased. Then began a clicking sound around the room, “like someone snapping one fingernail against another.” The sounds followed her into the dining room, she said, but stopped when her grandson came in.
A Michigan couple who didn’t believe in ghosts were guests at the B&B when the man went to his car to get something from the trunk and returned, she said, “pale as a ghost.” He told her that he had found his car running and he couldn’t turn it off; that the air conditioner was on full blast, but they had not been using the air conditioner—and his keys were in his pocket.
I’ve omitted names and exact locations in some of these accounts because ownership of the property involved may have changed.
Last but not least, state and city police called me, years ago, to a small home in Grayson County where they said they’d seen furniture moving on its own and other paranormal activities that have never been explained. In the police officers’ presence, I witnessed a tiny locket instantly relocate by itself some 7 feet across a room. That’s all I’ve ever seen … but that was enough!
